It's Opening Day at Del Mar. The start of the 13th Bing Crosby Season. The turf course is pristine, the main track is in top shape and the flowers and greenery are looking good in the paddock. It's a day of celebration for horse players and a culmination of weeks of hard work by the people behind the scenes.
The days leading up to the Bing Crosby Season at Del Mar are always filled with a touch of anxiety. Unlike its big brother in the summer, the fall meet doesn't have nearly 90 years of traditions and history to fall back on like the summer meet provides.
"This is the first time in three years we're not hosting the Breeders' Cup," notes Del Mar racing secretary David Jerkens. "The fall meet generally has a different vibe. It's more of a ship-in meet. There will probably be about 300 horses here for a majority of the meet, which allows for the trainers who are here to pretty much have their own racetrack.
The fall meet has come a long way since its inception in 2014 and it's still growing, still building on a reputation as one of the premier race meets of the year.
"The fall meet I kind of take day by day," Jerkens admits. "It's not as patterned as the summer. You have a better idea of the path of how the summer falls into place. But the Bing Crosby meet there's a lot of unknowns. It's a guessing game. To make it work you need good weather and the horsemen to support it."
What it has going for it is the turf racing. By this time of year most of the big east coast racetracks have abandoned turf racing for the year because of deteriorating weather conditions. Even when they do schedule turf racing back east, connections never know if those races will stay on the grass from one day to the next. That leaves the sunny west coast with a corner on the market. Outfits like Chad Brown, Brad Cox and Todd Pletcher generally don't like surprises and when Del Mar writes a quality grass race it usually goes off as planned.
"Jonathan Thomas shipped in 25 horses," Jerkens says. "I think you're going to see a lot of out-of-town outfits the last week. I was in Kentucky for the Breeders' Cup and just general feedback was positive. I think our local contingent in certain stakes races looks a bit stronger than last year but I'm encouraged by our stakes on the last week. They're going to do well."
The Bing Crosby Season came to be following the closure of Hollywood Park back in 2013. There were two months of racing dates available in California and when state officials asked Del Mar to assume a few weeks the fall meet was born. To help jump start the new meet, the seaside oval assumed many of the old Hollywood Park graded stakes races like the Matriarch, the Hollywood Turf Cup and the Hollywood Derby.
Then to distinguish the new meet from other Del Mar adopted a Hollywood theme, an homage to Bing and Hollywood Park. Racing officials created the Betty Grable Stakes that will run on Sunday and the Desi Arnaz and Bob Hope Stakes that run over the second weekend of the meet. There's also the Cecil B. DeMille and the Jimmy Durante on closing weekend and let's not forget today's Opening Day feature, the Let It Ride Stakes, named after the popular horse racing movie from the '80s.
"We directly follow Santa Anita and they had a good fall meet," Jerkens states. "I always like to start strong and build that momentum. We put some categories on Opening Day that filled well. The Let It Ride Stakes got good numbers.
"There's more competition this fall," Jerkens adds. "New York has changed some of its stakes races and they have the new facility (Belmont Park). Oaklawn Park is opening earlier (November 27) so there's a little more competition on the calendar."
The Bing Crosby Season is 13 days of quality racing spread out over the month of November. Every Friday, Saturday and Sunday of this month. Racing will start a bit earlier than during the summer. First post is 12:30 p.m and this year Thanksgiving racing returns. To accommodate everyone who wants to play the horses and not miss out on Thanksgiving dinner, post time on Thursday, November 26 is at 11 a.m.
This press release has not been edited by BloodHorse. If there are any questions please contact the organization that produced the release.
